1932-33 – May Robson
Lady for a Day
This was a movie that I’ve seen before since it was nominated for Best Picture, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. May Robson is, of course, the lady mentioned in the title, and she was fantastic. In fact, if I had been a member of the Academy at the time, I might have voted for Robson to take home the Oscar for Best Actress. She was fantastic, and honestly, as much as I enjoy the winner for 1933, Katharine Hepburn, I think Robson deserved the Oscar more than the well-loved Hepburn.
She begins the movie as an old lonely woman who is so poor that the only money she earns is made by selling apple on the street. Everyone knows her as Apple Annie. When she was a young woman, she left her infant daughter at a convent in Europe and spent the rest of her life sending her all the money she could to pay for her upbringing. As the girl grew, Annie lied to her, making her daughter believe that she was a wealthy lady, a member of the high society in New York.
But when her daughter becomes engaged to a Spanish Count who wants to visit her in her in America, Annie is ready to kill herself rather than facing the shame of the lie and her life of destitution. Fortunately, a wealthy and superstitious criminal thinks of Annie and her apples as his gambling good luck charm. He takes pity on her, and sets Annie up as the lady her daughter believed her to be for the duration of the Count’s visit, giving her an extreme make-over to be convincing.
Robson was quite believable as the poor alcoholic woman living in near-squalor. They gave her a haggard look that really sold the character. But more than that, the look in her eyes held a poignant combination of sadness, shame, and a hint of the madness with which only desperate people are familiar. But the transformation of the make-over was brilliant. Being a member of the upper echelon of wealthy society is not something that can be learned in a week. Robson played the character in such a way as to make it clear that she had once been as wealthy pretending to be. And I can’t help thinking that after the movie’s end credits are done rolling, Annie was fated to go back to her squalor. For me, it turns the happy ending into a very bittersweet one. What a great performance, Robson!